Thank God The World's Ending At Least
by Barry Eysman
Summary: Markie enters The Twilight Zone and exits to the worst fate imaginable


Markie

Thank God The World's Ending At Least

By

Barry Eysman

The first thing Markie did that last brief bright Spring afternoon in the midst of all that green was to fly over the handlebars of her Tuffy bike, though this was not in her lexicon of things to do that day or any day, for she was no limber gymnast and this was not her desire, to go out with more than a little pain as she dispensed with gravity for a brief illusory moment, said gravity now ditching her down arrow-like, without protective helmet, for it seemed if the world was coming to an end today, there should be that brief benevolence that allows a ten year old girl to ride her Tuffy bike in freedom and safety, without God getting huffy-she would not laugh at the rhyme, certainly not now as she bulleted to the sidewalk-did not Mother ever tell you never to ride your bicycle on the sidewalk, for in truth a bump and a little cross hatch had done for her this deed, though it was Markie herself who was being punished for those in pay by the city, some city, it was a po'dunk town, though where that descriptive phrase, which sounded somewhere in the vague profanity of pissy, and she did in truth feel more than a little pissy now—was that damned—whoops, sorry Mommy—sidewalk with its bump and cross hatch and tufts of grass sticking out of what she now saw was an inch or less of tear in the fabric of the sidewalk—how odd the things in a person's brain in a nano- second as she is going down, her arms straddling, her legs spraddling, her heart racing, her black pig tails, not that the rest of the hair on her head was not black as well—as she went tumble not—just up and over—and up and over meant down we go as she hoped she had not torn her panties, especially in a very embarrassing place—oh please don't let me have wet myself-as the world went upside down, then right side up, then sideways forward, and sky and sidewalk—damned sidewalk—you aren't here, Mother, if you were you would understand my brief foray into profanity—as she looked at various: upside down sky, moon pie grass crescent on yon hill—and little Markie on the last brief bright spring day in the history of forever—and she crashed like a plane in flight, like rather Markie in flight and here she went per klop in her organdy summer shirt with pale oval buttons and a V cut, for she would never know the joy of womanly breasts or the hands that were destined to keep grabbing at the rubbery unpleasantly heavy things, and when it comes to nursing a baby, let me tell you something, sister—god, avoid that at all costs—she told that to Markie who was not her sister, Mother did not have a sister, but Markie was her daughter and in a little while longer, sometime soon, she and Mother and the whole bloody world of life would be gone and freedom would reign supreme—hail glory.

All Markie knew was that her head hurt something awful.

She lay akimbo. Her Mother's pissy little girl, for she called her her pissy little girl at one time, though she corrected herself, finger still waving in her pissy little girl's face, saying to Markie, she, Mother, still angry as could be, she meant her prissy little girl, and that would have been all right-being called a prissy little girl, for she took great stock in patterning herself after the prissy little girl, Margaret, in the Dennis the Menace comic strips, and knew if her father had not left the premises when his prissy little daughter was in the room womb of her mother and his to-be-ex-wife, he would have had, she knew without doubt, a needle nose just like Dennis the Menace's father, though she knew Margaret of the stuck up nose, Markie had one just like it, and the sausage row curls, Markie, who secretly went under the name of Margaret, would have but Mother stamped her foot down and forbad it, well, she really didn't stamp her foot down and forbid it, she said, Mother did, I stamp my foot down and forbid it and when Mother forbad anything it was for sure sake's not to be tampered with, so to Markie, aka Margaret, Mother was pissy, and Markie, aka Margaret was prissy, as now she sat up on her shaking legs that were hurt like glass had been embedded in them, her head was bleeding above the left eye and dripping on her round glasses, like her heroine's glasses, that got by Mother-dar at least, as she tried to take her glasses off and clean them on her now smudged and torn at the left shoulder shirt, so it would have done no good to have done such a thing, which made it not matter, for the sake of the glasses, if not for the sake of Markie, that her left wrist was sprung, not like a watch was sprung, or maybe so, for she saw her watch crystal broken and realized she was wearing her Hanna Montana underwear and Mother said always dress properly in your underwear because you never know when you will be in a head-on collision and your head half hanging on your neck, if you have a head left, and knowing you little girl—well, you just see how you feel when you get to the emergency room and everybody laughs at your silly underwear or torn underwear or no underwear—MARKIE—and Markie had inwardly shrugged, this being Mother's idea, not something Markie had done, which was silly, and made her laugh later, but now the thought lightning bolted her brain which hurt, even though she was a smart girl, a very smart girl, from kindergarten onward, look at all the supposedly smart people who think kindergarten is really kindergarden, and what pray tell is a kinder garden, other than a garden that is mean, and now she felt her day going away, as she thought everyone on earth is going to have a head on collision, including she, yes, she thought that is correct, she, not me, but there will be no emergency room to be taken to, to risk being laughed at in her Hanna Montana underwear—God, the kid's head is severed almost off in that collision and her arm is twisted behind her back like a pretzel—examine all of her—what?—oh hahhhahahahhaha-Hanna Montana-emergency room in uproar of hilarity.

Well, this'll show 'em, she thought as she held her sprained wrist and then saw hey there really are glass shards, from a Pepsi bottle over there on the side of the walk way, well, she mused philosophically, pretty soon we shall all be litter, and then in a nonce, this was I talked, this was me, this was me falling off my—OMG—totaled back, front caved in, handlebars twisted here and yon, front tire flat as a flitter, well, this is just ducky, now I, who never screws up—you better watch your mouth, young lady, she told herself, you have never been prone to profanity, though, she mused yet again, I would not mind being prone to David Gordon-Levitt, if he were prone beside me, show me any other pissy or prissy or a combination of both who know all the meanings of the word prone, for the dictionary is my friend, but here am I, in a mess, all I need for it to do now is to start raining.

It started to rain.

Damnation, she said, and tried to pout, but her lower lip was banged up and bleeding, and God is going to wash out all our mouths with soap any moment now, so might as well swear—her head hurt like the Dickens-one Mr. Charles? Or somebody who had an aversion to the man or his books which gave said man, or woman, I remind you, this is the time to not practice sexism, and to love your fellow man and woman real hard cause the end is nigh and God says so or else. So the skies opened up and a spring heavy rain was glubbing her upturned nose which she had to downturn so she would not drown, but this was not the end, because the fire next time, sayeth God and James Baldwin, or writeth them both, which seemed awfully mean of God, no flood, here's the rainbow to mean it, but next time everybody's going to be bar-b-que, Markie thought in a sprained ankle way as she tried crawling in her blue summer shorts, dripping, her shirt, dripping, her Mary Janes and bobby socks dripping, the rain cold on her dripping wet and bloody head and her cut and on her banged up lip, as she put her hands to the lamp post which gave each hand one splinter of woo to a customer, as she yelled, more in spite and vanity than in pain-look at it this way, this is a rehearsal for the really big bike crash coming soon and Preacher Harvey always said God puts us to the test to get us ready and make us better; come to think of it, that was his reason, rather, God's reason for everything apparently, and Preacher Harvey, between long time outs to hit us for money, just seemed to say that same old thing over and over, and I sure picked a fine time to cuss and be irreligious now that we're as Preacher Harvey and everyone around her and on TV were saying and seemed bizarrely happy about it, as if there whole lives had been an endless bike wreck and they were glad to be thrown that final time, while Markie tried to raise herself on her broken bike she had leaned against the wet splintery wood of the lamp post, then falling again on her bad ankle and then just sitting there, thinking well this is a fine how de do and what a way to go, since we're going nowhere and really going SOMEWHERE pretty soon, might as well just sit here in the blood and the rain looking at those houses facing me out of which not one person has come out to help me, too busy loving their fellow man or woman, and then she realized that was probably exactly what they were doing, and began to laugh hysterically—which combinations were they loving in, as the rain water ran down the gutter and a dog barked up the street and Mother had told her a very brief ride, which was to be ten minutes—on the dot-for Markie especially never disobeyed orders that ended in the phrase "on the dot," and though her watch was smashed, she knew it had been well over ten minutes, but this was how little Markie ended and so as Kurt Vonnegut Jr. wrote "So it goes."

The cold Autumn air blew spring warm out and colder rain in, as the tin can made yellow school bus came clanking down the early October morning street and hissingly braked by her as the yellow door sprang open, as God in the form of Mr. Vinzetty, the driver came out to see how badly Markie was hurt in her bike wreck, and though she protested mightily that she was right as rain, he used his cell phone to call 911 for an ambulance so she would be taken to the emergency room where they would laugh at her Hanna Montana underwear, and realizing all of this would have been better than that fate, the end of the whole world, and how selfish does it get? Reminding herself she was hardly alone in such monumental selfishness, when the ambulance roared its flashing lights and sirens up, she tried to crawl away, anything, I'm fine, take me home, let me go to school, let me die—but it was no little Missie, you need some tending to (you wearing torn or funny underwear), one of the ambulance men said it, she heard him say it, then heard him snicker, then, you gotta go to the emergency room, as they put her, she who brooked no laughter at her expense, and anyone who tried it got a knuckle sandwich, on the stretcher, her dress, for she was not wearing shorts in cold October, for that would be stupid-o, was fanned by the wind, for a moment, upward, as the avid eyes of the children on the bus looked at her Hanna Montana panties and roared with laughter thus her whole life was forever destroyed and she made this sound as they smoothed her dress down and carried her to the ambulance--

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!


End file.
